Basketball
After just four seasons on the job, Johnnie Harris is out at Auburn, marking the second head coach opening in the Southeastern Conference as March Madness approaches.
Multiple sources told SB Nation that the writing was on the wall for Harris when John Cohen was hired as the athletic director a few years ago and didn’t reward her with a contract extension for making the NCAA Tournament last season, the Tigers’ first trip to the big dance since 2019. Despite working at Mississippi State as an assistant coach for eight years and wanting the head job when Vic Schaefer left for Texas in 2020, Cohen didn’t promote Harris to when he was previously the AD in Starkville.
The results on the court made the decision easier for Cohen to dump Harris. Despite a First Four appearance for Auburn last season, Harris never had a winning record in SEC play during her four seasons there. Overall, she was 58-63.
To hire a coach better than Harris though, Auburn will likely have to open its wallet a bit wider. According to USA Today, Harris was the second-lowest paid coach in the SEC last year (a data pool that excludes Vanderbilt’s Shea Ralph, since her private school salary is not public).
Auburn has had some big moments of success in women’s basketball, none higher than the late 1980s and early 1990s when it appeared in three consecutive national title games, losing each one. Auburn teams coached by Joe Ciampi went to six Elite Eights and won four SEC Tournament titles. Nell Fortner had success there in the 2000s too, winning a regular season SEC title with DeWanna Bonner leading the way. Terri Williams-Flournoy went to three NCAA Tournaments in nine seasons in the 2010s.
But now, Auburn needs to be rebuilt.
Here’s a few people that Cohen might call for the job.
Sam Purcell
The last time Cohen had to hire a women’s basketball coach — at Mississippi State in 2022 — he called Purcell, who had previously been one of Jeff Walz’s top lieutenants at Louisville and helped the Cardinals make two trips to the Final Four. Purcell has done well at Mississippi State, currently enjoying his third straight season of at least 20 wins and eyeing his second NCAA Tournament berth. We’ve seen SEC coaches jump from one school to another within the league before in many sports, including women’s college basketball. Most recently, Joni Taylor went from Georgia to Texas A&M in 2022. Aside from Purcell previously having a working relationship with Cohen, it’s worth noting that he is a graduate of Auburn and got his start in coaching there as a video coordinator. Purcell’s buyout at Mississippi State is just under $1 million.
Oh, and the guy who took Auburn to three Final Fours a few decades ago? That’s Purcell’s father-in-law.
Carly Thibault-DuDonis
It’s a near guarantee that Cohen will call Thibault-DuDonis at some point this month, and he won’t be the only Power 4 athletic director doing so. One of the fastest rising stars in coaching circles in the sport, the 33-year-old has quickly established Fairfield as a mid-major power, going 70-20 there in three seasons. In addition to making the NCAA Tournament last year, she’s led the Stags to victories over major programs in Arkansas, Wake Forest, Villanova, Rutgers and St. John’s. The daughter of three-time WNBA Coach of the Year Mike Thibault, she was also an assistant under Schaefer at Mississippi State while Cohen was the AD there. The Bulldogs appeared in the national title game in both of her seasons on Schaefer’s staff.
Aaron Roussell
This would be quite the step up for Roussell, who has been voted as Coach of the Year in the Atlantic 10 in back-to-back seasons now and has Richmond in a position to land a rare at-large berth in the NCAA Tournament, should the Spiders falter in the conference tourney. Rousell has been a winner everywhere he’s been, from the Division III ranks in Chicago, to Bucknell and now Richmond. 11 of his teams — soon to be 12 — have played in postseason tournaments since he first became a head coach 20 seasons ago. Auburn could do much worse than hiring Roussell.
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